Gonzo Vermont: The Dubie Dodge Does Mark Johnson
September 3, 2010 | Leave a Comment
Vermont’s Republican candidate for governor, Brian Dubie, was recently on WDEV’s Mark Johnson Show. If you’re even remotely into Vermont politics, you must listen to this interview. It is, at the very least, very fine entertainment.
You know, kind of like the Rocky Horror Picture Show and all.
Dubie’s just whacked. And I mean that in a good and bad way. Sure, he might be fun to “have a beer with,” but let’s face it, the man is just off when trying to play politics.
Listening or watching Brian Dubie is like being forced to endure a bad imitation of George W. Bush. It’s just awkward.
But Dubie – like Bush — seems to just chuckle his way through life, stalling and bobbing his way around anything that feels “off script” for him. And “off script” for Dubie has quite an expansive definition, including (so far in this campaign): Engaging in debates, answering the media’s questions at length (Dubie gave them 11 minutes at his last news conference), and taking talk radio phone calls.
Hmm. What’s that about Dubie and talk radio? According to Gonzo Vermont’s sources, when Dubie was scheduled to appear on Johnson’s radio program, the campaign had two major concerns: 1.) The length of the interview, thus the amount of time to force Dubie to think and talk on his own, and 2.) The callers.
The Dubie campaign handled the “two issues” by implementing a strategy that even Brian could understand: Stall/evade and have your friends call in.
Cool, as Dubie would say.
Dubie implemented the stall with near perfection. The campaign arranged it so Dubie’s appearance on Johnson’s show would be “just before” the release of the campaign’s much-touted “economic plan for Vermont.” By having the release of the report scheduled in another part of the state at about the exact time the Johnson radio show was to end, Dubie got to say something like this about four dozen times in the course of the interview (read: stalling): “Our economic plan will be released later today, and the details are all in it. And I don’t want to steal its thunder here with you on the radio.”
Listen for yourself. And count how many times Dubie uses the release time/date of the report to evade any specifics about his economic plan and/or to dodge most anything he found to be politically uncomfortable.
Dubie’s little game of dodge ball continued when he met the members of the Vermont media at the plan’s official release and gave them exactly 11 minutes to ask questions about what he called (over and over again) a “very detailed plan.”
Well, certainly worth every bit of the 11 minutes he gave to the Fourth Estate to ask about it.
Ladies and gentlemen, meet “The Dubie Dodge.”
And it’s government funded! At least for the last eight years that Dubie’s been doing something – no one’s quite sure what – as our Lt. Governor.
Unless you drink the Red-State-Kool-Aid, it’s just weird. I mean, does Brian Dubie think we’re stupid enough to NOT notice his constant Dubie Dodges? I guess so. Over and over again.
But, then again, Paul Beaudry won the Republican nomination for Congress in Vermont. That should tell us a sweet something about the Vermont Republican crowd: Wrong & Proud! And the wronger, the prouder and the louder, baby – as Beaudry might say.
So Dubie stalled and evaded through the interview, embarrassingly so, killing time with his breathless proclamations about the release – oh the mighty release! – of his soon-to-be-released – OMG he said release again! – report. Got it.
And then the always-perky Mark Johnson (unless, of course, you dare to broach the subject of media sloppiness in Vermont) declared that it was time for listener phone calls.
The first caller was something like this: “Brian, you are running against the devil. Do you think that will be hard?”
Okay, okay, I’m paraphrasing. But I did run it through my Red-State-Voter-Translator.
But then the second caller had a probing question that went something like this: “Brian, your opponent is the devil. Does that scare you?”
Again, paraphrasing.
They were, of course, calls planted as firmly, deeply, and happily as the begonias on your porch. Which is fine, I guess, given the level of absolute ninniness of modern mainstream politics. Par for the course, as they say.
I’m still the idiot who believes there are other people out there like me who can smell the skunk that has settled so comfortably upon our body politic. Probably because I’ve always had a crush on Pollyanna. I was once certain, for example, that everyone was laughing hysterically like I was while watching a Bush debate. Any Bush debate.
The need for the Dubie campaign’s Mark Johnson strategy became apparent when Dubie went “off script” with his comments about the mechanically and politically bedeviled Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant.
“I’ve got two words for that,” Dubie said. “No, make that four words: Safety, trust, and jobs.”
Well, I guess if we let him count “and” as a word pertaining to Vermont Yankee, he got to four. Good luck with that.
And now we know why stalling and evading is important to the Dubie campaign when they let the Loose Cannon (aka: Dubie) roam into the scary waters of having to think on his feet.
Brian Dubie will be the gift that keeps giving this campaign season. Or, as Brian would say, there are four words for why you should vote for him: Laughter, entertainment, and amusement.
Cool.
VT Media Watch: Totten Pimps for Welch (again)
September 18, 2009 | 6 Comments
Geez, Shay Totten’s love affair with Congressman Peter Welch is the blogging gift that keeps giving this week. Less than forty-eight hours after his fawning print piece on Welch hit the newsstands, Totten went to the Seven Days blog to make sure that we all know that his journalistic pimpmanship will be there for the good congressman whenever he calls (or issues a news release).
Totten’s blog piece today was little more than a full-throated rehash of the news release that Welch’s office issued regarding the education bill that the House voted to pass yesterday. But what’s not mentioned in the blog entry is that the education bill in question also contained the amendment to de-fund ACORN – an amendment that – unlike Leahy and Sanders – Welch voted in favor of. Yes, Welch voted with the rightwing lunatics and wishy-washy middle to de-fund ACORN based on the very serious (and well-publicized) allegations of wrongdoing by its staff members.
Again, Totten didn’t do his homework. Because while the rest of the media across the nation focused on the very newsworthy ACORN section of the education bill, Totten completely ignored it. Instead, letting Welch all but hijack his keyboard so that lines like this could be delivered to his Vermont readers:
Vermont students will receive $60 million more in Pell Grants, and an additional 2,985 students will be eligible over the next 10 years, according to figures released by US Rep. Peter Welch (D-VT).
Welch successfully amended the bill Thursday morning to ensure that non-profit lenders like VSAC can continue providing ancillary services such as college counseling, career placement, financial aid and financial literacy. It also ensures that borrower services – for example, delinquency prevention and default aversion – are allowed uses of the new State Innovation Completion Grants.
“I am pleased that my amendment will help VSAC continue its critical outreach services, which have helped so many Vermonters take advantage of higher education and the opportunities that come with it,” said Welch in a statement.
Great. But what about the ACORN part of the bill? It wasn’t even mentioned. I guess that can happened when you’re too dizzy from all that spin, huh Shay?
Interestingly, Totten made quite the story out of the fact that Vermont’s Senators Leahy and Sanders did the right thing earlier in the week by voting against the Senate version of the bill to de-fund ACORN. So, in case you’re keeping track at home, Totten’s rules on covering Vermont incumbents goes something like this: Promote, promote, promote. And never criticize.
While going back to check Totten’s story about the Leahy/Sanders “no” votes, I noticed that he had gone back to “update” it to include the news of the Welch ACORN vote. Thus, buried deep down below several other blog posts and at the bottom of that particular post was this “update:”
After several requests from Seven Days, Rep. Peter Welch today explained his vote to ban the low-income advocacy group ACORN from receiving federal funds.
“The actions taken by ACORN employees reveal a disturbing and intolerable pattern of abuse of taxpayer dollars. The organization must be held accountable – and Congress must get back to work on reforming our health care system so that all Americans have access to quality and affordable health care.”
And that’s it. No further comment from Totten on the matter.
Sorry, but this is getting weird. If Totten and Seven Days are going to get all fawning over Leahy and Sanders’ votes to stop the de-funding of ACORN, one would expect a finely honed jab or two toward Welch for his completely wrong-headed opposite vote.
Instead, all we get is a reprint of a Welch statement. Worse, it’s a statement that would be about as easy as watching the weather change in Vermont to pick apart.
Here, let me show you: If Welch believes that “a disturbing and intolerable pattern of abuse of taxpayer dollars” is reason to cut off federal funding to an organization without even a hearing, why doesn’t Welch cut off funding for the Abu Ghraib-occupying Department of Defense? Just saying.
And why let Welch get away with his topic-changing nonsense about getting “back to work on reforming health care”? Ever chew gum and walk at the same time, Congressman? Besides, Welch has already announced that he’s not going to fight for single-payer or universal health care coverage, so why let him get away with a statement that pretends he’s in favor of full “access to quality and affordable health care”? Because supporting a health insurance corporation reform plan – which he’s hinted at doing – is anything but accessible or affordable. Been there, done that.
If Totten and Seven Days had any alternative gumption left in them, the headline today should have been: Welch Sides with Glenn Beck Nation, Votes to De-fund ACORN.
Shame on them all.
[Addendum: A reader wrote in earlier today to Broadsides to draw attention to a story by Anne Galloway at VTDigger.org regarding Welch’s propensity to secure military contracts for Vermont businesses. It is, indeed, a great story. In fact, it’s a great contrast to Totten’s fawning coverage of Welch. Read it.]
VT Media Watch: Link Edition
August 25, 2009 | 7 Comments
Fun with Blurt: I couldn’t help myself yesterday afternoon when I found myself hitting the “send” button after typing a comment to Pamela Polston’s little public backrub session with Bernie Sanders at the 7Days blog. Go read it HERE if you’re interested in the back and forth. Diabetics beware, though, because you might need a shot of insulin.
Bottom line: If mainstream politicians “love” your work, you can no longer call yourself “alternative.” Because you’ve clearly morphed into a “player” at that point on Team Power Elite. Deal with it. Or, in the case of 7Days, make a pun of it, offer an award for it, and then throw a party in honor of yourself.
Earth to Polston: Bernie’s returning your phone call so quickly because he knows you’re willing to play ball with him (read: you gush, rather than dig, when it comes to covering him).
Pulitzer was right when he declared that “newspapers should have no friends.” Because when newspapers seek friends – or gush about their friendships with those they’re supposed to be covering – the news they report becomes suspect at best.
The day Bernie refuses to return Polston’s calls is the day I’ll know that 7Days has become “alternative.”
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A Neighborhood Walk: I was coaxed away from work yesterday (oh, that’s hard) by the vacationing Stacy (aka: the wife) so that we could venture up our road (Gould Hill) and take our inaugural hike on the new trail that was recently finished on our neighbor’s land. Wow. The five-mile back-and-forth loop from our doorstep was incredible, endless hills included. Susan Allen at the Times Argus wrote about the new section of the trail in yesterday’s paper if you want to learn more about it.
Bravo to the Kaeding family of Worcester for opening up their gorgeous piece of land to non-motorized forms of recreation – including horses! It’s a real treat.
Speaking of horses, I decided to take my overly-fed saddle horse, Black Bart, for a ride last night in the hopes of getting to the Kaeding’s new trail. Unfortunately, Fat – err, Black – Bart was huffing and puffing by the time we got up Gould Hill so badly that I decided to turn around. Let’s just say that he’s now in training: A little bit more every day. Perhaps tonight we’ll make it to the actual new trail…
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VT Commons on a Roll: Rob Williams, the Wizard behind the Vermont Commons website and organization, has been on a roll this week by posting a couple of fantastic pieces on their blog.
The first one that caught my attention was by Eric Andrus, a fellow draft horse enthusiast, who penned a great essay on the importance of “local wheat and bread.” Read it.
Also served up at Vermont Commons this week is an important essay the role of Congress when it comes to declaring war. As we all know, Congress has been largely abdicating its war-making powers to the president in recent decades, resulting in one nefarious, illegal and disastrous military action after another. Enough already.
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NTodd Never Sleeps: NTodd Pritsky, that is – the indefatigable blogger, activist and father-to-be. Because if NTodd ever slept, he wouldn’t be posting all the stuff he posts all the time at his very entertaining and necessary blog that can be found HERE. Click, read, and enjoy.
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That’s all, folks. I’ve got horses to tend to.
VT Media Watch: 7Days’ Ober
August 19, 2009 | 2 Comments
The new girl on the 7Days block, Lauren Ober, has been delightfully snarky in her writing for the sometimes “alternative” Vermont newsweekly. After being rescued from the sinking ship known as the Burlington Free Press (snore), Ober’s been serving up one dose of think-smack after another for those of us who need our daily dose but – unfortunately – have to look far outside the “I Love Vermont” club to find it.
Ober’s targets so far have been the obvious and the super-safe (read: right-wing-evangelicals, etc.) but her writing’s been refreshing and punchy. Let’s just hope that Ober doesn’t get drowned out by the creative wet blanket that can be the pun-happy and cutesy-obsessed culture at 7Days.
It would also be nice to see Ober turn her snarky pen on the Vermont dopes who need a good smackdown from time to time.
Click here for Ober’s 7Days blog post for today: Westboro Baptist Band of Crazies Coming to Vermont? http://7d.blogs.com/blurt/2009/08/westboro-baptist-band-of-crazies-coming-to-vt.html
What can I say, I’m a sucker for writing like this (an excerpt from the link Ober link above):
Here’s a little background on Mr. Phelps (no relation to human fish cum mad toker Michael Phelps) and his Westboro Baptist Church. Apparently God visited Phelps and was all like, “Yo son, what’s wrong with this world? Dudes are doing other dudes and it goes against my will ‘n’ shit.” And Phelps was all like, “Oh, word, homes. Guys screwing other guys in the poopshoot ain’t cool. I gotta do sumpin’ about this.” And God was all like, “Dawg, you need to represent me on Earth. Ain’t nobody down there listening to me.” And Phelps was all like, “God/Jesus/the holy spirit, I feel you. You can count on me.” Then he started making crazypants signs that say God Hates Fags and Thank God For AIDS and other awesome stuff like that. Sign Guy Steve totally ripped them off.
Write on, Lauren.
Catch-Up Blogging
July 13, 2009 | 2 Comments
I’m back. Sort of.
Because I spent a lot of time trying to relax and now I feel like I need some more time trying to fend off all the nonsense that made me not relax. (Note to ex-therapist: I know, I know, no one or nothing can “make me” do anything, but…whatever.)
Goddamn vacations. But I guess someone has to do it.
Pick me! Pick me!
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Thanks, Dad, for a great retreat.
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Politics, American Style: So, having been privileged enough to have the New York Times within a short walk’s distance every morning last week, I can report that the political status of our nation is… well…fucked.
And, as usual, I’ll keep my sharpened pen pointed at the good liberals – who certainly should know better.
The liberals, of course, have been focused on their kindergarten-like fixation on all-things-Sarah-Palin while continuing to ignore the rug that that their electoral-season hero, Obama, has been pulling out from under them.
If you don’t believe me, just pick up one of the last several columns by the liberal darling Maureen Dowd of the Times. Here, I’ll summarize them for you: Palin is an idiot and I am a clever genius for repeatedly pointing it out. Okay, okay, we get it: Palin is a dimwit. Not to mention an easy target.
But how about a little focus on the issues of the day – especially those that Obama and his Democratic accomplices in Congress are fumbling and/or ignoring daily? You know, things like the war, health care and economic justice (read: where’s the economic relief for those who truly need it?).
Oh, but it’s nice to see that Goldman Sachs is about to post record profits, isn’t it?
Making daily fun of Sarah Palin is a no-brainer. Been there. Done that.
What needs to be done now is to put a spotlight on the Democratic Party’s back-pedaling on nearly every major issue of the day. For years, these same Democrats fed the populace lines about “not having the White House,” or “not having both houses of Congress,” or “not having a filibuster-proof majority.” Well, those excuses are long gone. So what are they waiting for? Courage? A belief in their own electoral-season rhetoric?
Forget Sarah Palin. She lost. You won. Now give us some results.
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Having said that, I will now break the rule. Deal with it.
I actually like it when the right-wingers start pouncing on Sarah Palin. Mostly because I love a good catfight. Meeeeeee-oooooooow.
The right-wing diva Peggy Noonan recently penned a piece in the Wall Street Journal in which she poked Sarah Palin for being an intellectual lightweight. Noonan insinuated that Palin should just disappear so as to protect the image of the Republican Party.
Oh yeah, the party of Ronald Reagan and Dan Quayle must protect its deep intellectual image…
Give me a break.
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Speaking of liberals (well, a while ago), Vermont’s Secretary of State, Deb Markowitz, is touting her office’s plans to give each member of the Vermont National Guard who is about to be deployed to Afghanistan for Obama’s War a 100-minute Verizon phone card so they can more easily phone home.
Fine, make it easier to phone home. But what about the bigger picture here? You know, like the unnecessary nature of the war?
Markowitz – a Democrat – is ginning up her soldier-phone-home effort as an early public relations move in her bid to become the Democratic candidate to unseat Governor Jim Douglas. See, she supports the troops.
But wouldn’t it be better for Democrats like Markowitz to be speaking out against the deployment orders and the wars rather than slipping those sent to fight a phone-home card?
Oh Democrats, you never cease to infuriate me.
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ATV comments: Last week, the Burlington Free Press reported that the comments submitted to the Agency of Natural Resources about its proposed rule to allow ATVs on state land were running between 3 and 4-to-1 against the proposal.
Well, what do you know, I was right: ATVers can’t write. But they sure can get in their monster trucks and drive, drive, drive to a public hearing. Perhaps if they put a motor on those pencils…
Bravo to Broadsides readers who certainly contributed significantly to the more than 1000 comments submitted the ANR. Now let’s see if the agency does the right thing. Don’t hold your breath.
Personally, I’m hoping for a good old-fashioned Conservation Law Foundation lawsuit on the matter. Those folks get things done.
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Reading: Paul Auster’s “Man in the Dark,” a slim novella that is as engaging and as hard to put down as any of Auster’s other masterful works. And this one’s got a Vermont connection, too, as its protagonist – August Brill — is a retired literature critic who moves to the Green Mountain State to be with his daughter.
Brill, his daughter and his granddaughter share a Vermont home and a common affliction: broken hearts as “the weird world rolls on.”
Brill also finds the nights challenging, often waking to an over-active mind and left with the challenge of directing his mind’s conversations away from the sad thoughts about his life’s losses and toward the more soothing make believe.
The result is a wonderful tale of a certain Owen Brick, a man who lives in the competing – and colliding – worlds in which Brill creates. And the only way Brick can put an end to it is if he find and kill Brill himself. Unless, of course, Brill kills off Brick first. Storytellers do get bored with their creations, you know.
Auster is a superb writer and this little novel matches the prowess he’s displayed in my particular favorites of his, “The New York Trilogy,” “The Music of Chance,” and “Leviathan.”
Read it.
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Last week a young man with a cheap sailboat took my father, my daughter and me out for a sailing lesson on Lake Champlain. It wasn’t really a lesson though. We were mostly too mesmerized by his sea ballet to focus on or retain much of what he was teaching. He called out the terms and performed the actions – tacking, watching for “luffing,” monitoring the jib, and beating – as we sailed back and forth on a mostly calm lake. It was a fine show. And a wonderful afternoon.
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Congrats to Greenpeace for its creative action against President Obama over his willy-nilly approach to global warming solutions.
More of that please.
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Thanks for playing. Now get back to work.
Gay Marriage Vote Postmortem
April 9, 2009 | 2 Comments
First off, congrats to Vermont for successfully overriding Governor Jim Douglas’s veto of the gay marriage bill. It’s now law – officially kicking in on September 1st.
While the clear “winners” in this victory are the gay and lesbian couples who can now get married and – hopefully – aim to do better than the 50% failure rate of man/woman marriages, there were also a number of political winners.
Beth Robinson, for example, the head of VT Freedom to Marry Coalition, was simply superb. She kept her coalition on message and, most impressively, rose above the angry mob of gay marriage opponents who all but taunted them throughout the public hearings. How, for example, they could remain cool, calm and collected while their opponents compared gay love to man/horse love or man/boy love or father/daughter love is beyond me. But they did. And they deserve credit for it.
The other political winner is first-year House Speaker Shap Smith, my representative by the way. Smith and Senate President Peter Shumlin did a masterful job of orchestrating the timing and the logistics of this bill. But Smith’s job was a whole lot more difficult than Shumlin’s since the Vermont Senate is a whole lot more liberal and smaller (read: manageable) than the House.
As you’ll recall, Shumlin and the last House Speaker, Gaye Symington, tried to get bold with their “super-majorities” in the last session on issues like global warming and taxing the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant but Symington failed to deliver the House. The reason she failed became clear when she decided to challenge Governor Douglas for his job: Symington’s a terrible communicator and leader.
Smith, on the other hand, is at least able to both articulate a thought and also be persuasive enough to bring along enough votes to win the day. That’s refreshing. And it’s also exactly what’s needed in this rare time when the Democrats have veto-proof majorities in the legislature.
Now let’s get to the losers. The person put first on every such list so far has been Governor Douglas. And I agree, but for different reasons. The conventional wisdom says that Douglas lost because his veto was overridden. True enough. But, for me, Douglas is a real loser on this issue for doing what he always does with tough issues: Play politics while pretending not to. It’s about as transparent as transparent can get – but it doesn’t stop the Vermont’s lapdog media from regurgitating his dopey proclamations (i.e. “gay marriage is a distraction).
I think Douglas got exactly what he wanted out of this issue. He got it off the legislative radar in a non-election year by having his veto overridden and he got to throw a bone to his right-wing Vermont base and growing national Republican base by issuing his veto. Mission accomplished, indeed.
But he’s still obviously the biggest loser for playing the highest-stakes game of politics with an issue that is truly about civil rights, civil compassion and simply providing some joy in a time of great civil strife.
Remember, Governor Douglas’ primary opposition to the gay marriage bill was based on the fact that it was “a distraction” to the more pressing matters that were facing Vermont, particularly the economy. But let’s see if he speaks up to scold the right-wing gay-bashers who are now frothing at the bit over their calls for “revenge,” “constitutional amendments,” and promises to “repeal and revolt” over the legislature’s actions.
Speaking of the gay-bashers, let’s delve deeper into the loser list. Next up, Steve Cable of Rutland, the self-anointed leader of the “oh-my-god-we’ll-die-if-gay’s-are-legitimized” crowd. Here’s how Cable described the mood of his shrinking number of followers to the Vermont Press Bureau after finding out – once again – that they were losers:
“[They’re] blood shooting out of their eyes mad.”
Wow. That’s dramatic. But the real question is: Will Cable continue to quote the Bible in defeat as he did during the entire time during the battle? I guess not:
“This isn’t about moving on,” Cable said. “This is about getting even.”
I guess Cable’s Bible doesn’t include that whole “turn the other cheek” reference.
Speaking of the Bible, the other major loser in this fight was the “Rev.” Craig Benson, another Rutland man who apparently loves to spew hate in the name of the Bible. Please, can someone find the passage in the Bible that glorifies hate, paranoia, false-judgment, and mean-spirited revenge? Because the “Rev.” Benson can’t.
Instead, the “Rev.” Benson joins his fire-breathing hate-monger, Steve Cable, in declaring a massive miscarriage of justice by those seeking love and justice. Go figure. Specifically, Benson mashed his sour grapes with this nonsense:
“Our side was outspent 20-1…and, given that, we were lucky the vote was so close.”
Proof on the spending? None. And for those of us who were “lucky” enough to receive all those calls from the out of state gay-bashers, I’d seriously question his spending accusation.
But what’s easy to dispute is Benson’s laughable claim that the votes were “close.” Since when did votes of 23-5 in the Senate and 100-49 in the House get considered to be “close”? Those votes are what the sports world would call “blow-outs.” And they were.
We can only hope that in the election season of 2010 Jim Douglas will be forced to join Cable and Benson in their caves of irrelevance. There may not be term limits in Vermont but there are limits on how long bigots can swim against the stream of justice – just ask all those Republicans in the 1950’s and ‘60’s who opposed giving civil rights to African-Americans. Yes, indeed, Jim Douglas is our George Wallace.
But let’s end on the positive note: Vermont rose to the occasion and, like its stand against slavery in the 18th Century, Vermont will be forever recognized for its courageous stand. Congrats.
Mark Johnson: The Vermont Power Elite’s Toadie
March 10, 2009 | 7 Comments
I’ve been homebound a bit more than I’d like lately. First, with a hideous chest cold and now to avoid the soggy ground and attempt to get some inside work done. And being inside for me usually means being a slave to the radio – talk radio to be precise.
In Central Vermont, local talk radio means WDEV to me. But I’m not sure how much more I can take – especially in the morning – as Mark Johnson of the not-so-cleverly-named “Mark Johnson Show” seems hell-bent in his milquetoast pursuit of playing the media lapdog to Vermont’s power elite.
If you’ve ever listened to Johnson, you’ll know what I’m talking about: He approaches his media role not like a probing reporter but more like a member – if not a leading member – of an insider’s club of Vermont’s media, economic and political elite. In other words, Johnson takes the exact opposite path of what the late, great Joseph Pulitzer saw as the true goal of the “fourth estate’: To have no friends.
For two hours a day, five days a week, Johnson brings forth a steady stream of his fellow club members, exchanging pleasant guffaws with them and lobbing softballs in their general direction, seemingly not bothered by the shallowness of it all. It is, after all, what maintains his membership to the “club.” Because we all know the quickest way to get kicked out of the Vermont media and political elite is to actually ask some tough questions of your fellow members. Bye-bye invites to “Vermont This Week,” for sure. And so long to those 15-minute puff-pieces with Leahy/Sanders/Welch/Douglas where allowing them to regurgitate their talking points masquerades as an “interview.”
If Johnson ever does demonstrate disdain for anyone, it’s usually the poor fool who dares to call into his show and criticize the media. Johnson will not tolerate it. Never mind that the Vermont media is an atrophied shadow of what the media really should be (and getting worse by the week given the layoffs and cutbacks), Johnson will not let even the mildest media critique get by without either a hang-up and/or a stern rebuke.
Most recently, for example, the leader of the Vermont Senate, Peter Shumlin, was a guest on Johnson’s show to discuss the Democratic leadership’s decision to put gay marriage on its priority list for this current session. The all-too-frequent and curmudgeonly old-guy callers (do these guys ever work?) to his show bombarded Shumlin with the Republican talking points, declaring that the gay marriage issue was a “distraction” to the real matters (read: economic) facing the state.
Shumlin hung in there quite admirably, trying – time and time again – to point out that the gay marriage bill wasn’t really taking up much time and, nevertheless, was merely one bill among dozens and dozens that the legislature was more than capable of considering.
But Shumlin crossed the Johnson line when he dared to venture into even the mildest of mild media criticism. “Well,” declared an almost exasperated Shumlin, “we held a press conference yesterday about our latest economic plan but you wouldn’t know it because the media didn’t cover it.”
“Wait, wait, wait,” interjected Johnson, “before you start criticizing the media…”
And Shumlin, being the good club member himself, knew that he had to back down, allowing Johnson’s rebuke to stand while shelving his very reasonable critique of the Vermont media and allowing its embarrassingly shallow coverage of the Statehouse go unchecked.
But Johnson’s at his all-time worst when he’s interviewing a fellow media club member. Take, for example, his interview today with WCAX’s Marselis Parsons. Johnson invited Parsons on after he read the news that Vermont’s own media dinosaur was considering retiring. The ensuing interview was little more than a mutual admiration love-fest: “Don’t you love what you do?”
Um, excuse me fellas, but you’re members of the media. So why don’t you loosen up your lover’s embrace long enough to ask a hard question in these incredibly hard times. You know, something like: How did the Vermont media completely blow it when it comes to the economic crisis? And why don’t we hold some of our life-long political figures accountable for fiddling while our economy burned?
Instead, we got things like: “Wow, you’ve been there for 42 years?” “I’ve only been around for half that time.” “Does it feel like it’s been that long?” “Tell me about your favorite interview?”
That, my friends, is how you remain in the club: lob softballs at your fellow club members, make no waves, and fantasize about all the accolades that might come your way after 42-years of doing little but shilling for the power elite. Oh yeah, Mark, you’re halfway there…
If Johnson ever does show disdain, it’s almost always for those who dare to criticize the media or hold Vermont politicians accountable. Instead of probing the power elite, Johnson acts as a firewall to seemingly protect them – thus assuring more bland interviews with his clubmates. “Tell me, Senator Leahy, how does it feel to be so powerful?” Yawn.
The only disdain Johnson ever shows is almost exclusively for those who dare to put a spotlight on the miserable state of the Vermont media. He simply won’t tolerate it. Much like he won’t tolerate any true people-based attempt to hold his poltical friends accountable for their dithering and/or outright assistance in bringing about the mess we’re currently in as a state and a nation.
Sadly, Johnson’s a proud member of the insider’s club and he’s not going to risk his next attempt to crawl into the laps of fellow members by – gasp! – asking some uncomfortable questions of them. There are rules, you know.
Johnson, of course, is no different than almost all of his fellow Vermont media brethren. They know how to keep buttering their bread, even if it means totally and completely bastardizing the real role of the media: Standing outside of the club so as to ask the tough questions and demand the real answers.
But one thing is for sure: Johnson gets his phone calls returned, especially when those on the other end know that little more than lobs will be coming their way. “Tell me, Senator Sanders, how does it feel to be so popular?”
Or maybe he’s just being honest because, after all, it is called the “Mark Johnson Show.” And it is, indeed, all about Mark Johnson and his cozy friendships with those who are willing to trade back-scratches and belly-rubs. Anything, that is, but make waves….
Sorry, Mr. Pulitzer, it’s a whole different era.
Victory! Cabot to Ban Bovine Growth Hormone!
January 28, 2009 | 17 Comments
Yes, the news is true. And, yes, my tongue is firmly in my cheek.
For those who don’t know and/or forgot (like I almost did), Food & Water – under the direction of yours truly – launched a campaign against Vermont’s own Cabot Creamery in 1995 when we learned that they were about to allow their farmers to use the Monsanto corporations synthetic bovine growth hormone (rBGH), Posilac. And, last week, Cabot announced that it was, indeed, going to be “listening to its customers” and banning the use of the cow drug by August of this year. Like I said: Victory! Yeah right.
There was one grammatical error in Cabot’s announcement however: They said they were listening to their “customers.” But what they should have said was “customer.” Because Cabot’s nearly-fifteen years of flinging their noses at their real customers who were demanding an end to its rBGH use was really stopped by one, single “customer”: Wal-Mart. Yep, it was the mega-retailer who let Cabot know that they were looking for hormone-free dairy products. And when Wal-Mart said, “jump,” Cabot said, “how high?” – especially when, according to dairy industry insiders, Wal-Mart is now responsible for nearly 25% of Cabot’s sales.
But, for the sheer fun of it, let’s step back and look at how Food & Water secured this “victory.” In the spring of 1995 as Food & Water was preparing to unveil a similar anti-rBGH campaign against Land 0’Lakes, an employee of Cabot Creamery approached me with the news that he had obtained an internal memo from Cabot’s headquarters that he was certain I would be interested in. The Cabot employee was right: The memo acknowledged that Cabot farmers were not only being allowed to use rBGH but that its use was well underway. And this was a time when Cabot was publicly declaring a “wait and see” attitude about Monsanto’s cow drug.
After confirming the authenticity of the memo and a few phone calls with Cabot’s executives, a campaign was born. As we said at the time, we weren’t about to go after the Minnesota-based Land O’Lakes for its use of rBGH and then ignore the same consumer and animal welfare transgressions by our neighbors, Cabot Creamery (at the time, Food & Water was headquartered in Walden, Vermont, a mere five miles up the road from Cabot).
The campaign generated enormous attention both here in Vermont and throughout the United States. While most anti-rBGH activists at the time were focused on lobbying the Food & Drug Administration or Congress, Food & Water saw the writing on the wall and, instead, directed our campaigns at the corporations seeking to use the product. I wrote an article at the time, in fact, that described the legislators and regulators as the mere “puppets” in the battle, while the Monsantos and the food corporations like Cabot were the “puppeteers.” And so we aimed directly at the folks holding the strings.
It got mighty heated, too. While our campaign generated thousands of letters, postcards and phone calls to Cabot’s offices demanding that they reverse their decision based on human health and animal welfare considerations, Cabot dug in their heels and called in their favors from Vermont’s political, media and economic elite to help them fight off the big, bad Food & Water.
The facts regarding rBGH’s link to cancer and its known contribution to animal disease and even death were mostly discarded by the rescue squad called in by Cabot to fend us off. Governor Howard Dean held a press conference to condemn us. Newspapers editorialized about our “tactics” being suspect (boycotts?). And even our peers in the consumer and environmental movement (yes, VPIRG and Rural Vermont) came to Cabot’s defense, urging us to take our campaign someplace else. Chickens. But, then again, they’re still operating at full-strength…
After hearing about Cabot’s fifteen-year change of rBGH policy, I wandered out to my barn to peruse my old Food & Water archives (stored in a horse stall, where the horses have dutifully defecated on them and found a real use for them: scratching posts). Oh boy, let the memories flow.
Here are some of my favorite moments while walking down the Cabot campaign memory lane this morning:
• After Food & Water unveiled a radio commercial targeting Cabot’s use of rBGH, Governor Howard Dean held a press conference condemning Food & Water, calling us a “terrorist group” and, while holding up a package of Cabot’s cheese, urged all Vermonters “to go home and eat two Cabot grilled cheese sandwiches.”
• Another “liberal” politician, Elizabeth Ready, a state senator at the time but later the state’s auditor, had this to say to Food & Water via the media: “Either pack your bags and hit the road or change your tactics.” And, remember, this was when we were simply asking people to “call Cabot” and ask them to stop using rBGH.
• Cabot’s spokesperson at the time, Roberta McDonald, was good for more than a few whacky comments about Food & Water, too. Following the Dean “terrorist” analogy, McDonald compared Food & Water to the Unabomber before declaring that, “locking up the leaders of Food & Water would be a better way to protect the people.” Yikes. I guess we were getting on her nerves, huh?
Funny, though, that we don’t hear the same kind of language now about Wal-Mart. I mean, they simply asked for the same thing Food & Water asked for fifteen years ago: Stop using rBGH. Oh well, I guess it’s all a matter of how you ask….
I’ll be sharing some more stories about the early years of Food & Water now that I’ve jumped down the rabbit hole of opening the old files and bringing the memories bubbling up from yesteryear. They were good times. We were fighting the good fight. We were just a decade and a half ahead of the curve of change.
Go figure.
The Pollina Campaign (Now & Forever), R.I.P.
August 20, 2008 | 4 Comments
Oh my, it’s nice to see Vermont’s liberal elite finally catch up to the obvious conclusions reached years ago here: Anthony Pollina is a loser. Duh. I mean, how many elections does he have to lose or otherwise foul with his disastrous decision-making before the scarlet “L” is permanently attached to his political being? Well, this is his fourth and, let’s hope, his last.
Pollina, as news reading Vermonters know by now, is in the middle of yet another one of his bizarre political tantrums, whereby he proves that the only “p” that matters to him is the “p” in “Pollina,” not principles. This time Pollina is once again shit-canning his “Mr. Campaign Finance Reform” label to – say what? – obliterate any and all of Vermont’s campaign finance laws. In other words, if he’s going to lose, he’s going to make sure all of Vermont loses, too. Oh boy, that’ll show ‘em!
This latest Pollina mess was created when he made the me, myself and I-based decision to turn his back on his Progressive Party and, instead, run as an “independent” for governor. But, much like he bungled the management of his Vermont Milk Company, Pollina botched this move, too, by failing to note that the fundraising rules were a whole lot different for so-called independents. Specifically, according to the Secretary of State’s interpretation of the rules, independents can raise $1,000 per contributor/per election and major party candidates get to raise $2,000.
Pollina stepped in the campaign finance doo-doo when he began his race for governor as a major party candidate, thus begging for the $2,000 checks, but then dissed that party for a run on his own. But wait. What about the thirty-some-odd folks who ponied up more than $1,000 to his campaign? Send the money back, says the Secretary of State. No way, says Pollina. And let the mess begin.
While Pollina certainly has a legitimate grief that the law as interpreted by the state is unfair to independents, he also should have made sure he knew the rules before playing the game. But that kind of sloppiness is par for the course for Pollina’s political career (quick, name something he’s actually succeeded at…time’s up).
But there are far bigger issues here than Pollina’s latest tantrum. By declaring that the Secretary of State’s interpretation of the rules are not accurate, Pollina is saying that there are no campaign finance rules due to the fact that – buckle your seatbelts, folks – the U.S. Supreme Court threw out Vermont’s campaign finance law and Governor Jim Douglas vetoed the Vermont legislature’s attempts to remedy them.
The result? Pollina thinks anarchy should rule, as in: There are no rules. But the Secretary of State’s office thinks that the previously enacted rules should be enforced, as in: $2,000 contribution limits for major party candidates and $1,000 limits for independents.
The supreme irony in Pollina’s current self-serving position is that he’s taking one, big almighty dump on his previously proclaimed principles by now declaring that there are no rules when it comes to raising political capital. Hmm, let’s think for a second: Whom might that help most? The rich? The powerful? The well connected? Yes. Yes. And yes. But, to Pollina, there’s nothing as easily dispensable as a principle in the path of his quixotic pursuits of (said with frustration and clenched teeth): Just. Winning. One. God. Damned. Race.
So, in other words, if Pollina fails to read the rules before making a decision, to hell with the rules! Worse, if his challenge to those rules means empowering those with all the power already, so be it. Because this is about the big “P”: Pollina, and only Pollina.
Shame on him.
And shame on the Attorney General’s office, too, for repeatedly making public comments that they would need to “receive a complaint” before looking into this matter. You’d think that an official declaration by the Secretary of State’s office would trigger an investigation. Hello? Do you folks ever talk?
But, worse, while speaking with the Attorney General’s office this morning, Assistant Attorney General, Mike McShane, admitted to me that due to the “increased attention” this matter was getting that they may be looking into it “eventually” anyway. In other words, unless the press and the blogs pay enough attention to an opinion issued by the Secretary of State’s office, the Attorney General’s office will ignore it? Give me a break.
So, in order to put an end to the nonsense between these two state agencies, my partner in crime (or, in this instance, my partner in crime prevention), Boots Wardinski, submitted the letter below to the Attorney General’s office. At the time the letter was faxed, I was informed that it – the letter – would be the official “trigger” to an investigation of this matter. Pathetic? Sure. But, oddly enough, necessary as well.
The letter:
August 20, 2008
Mike McShane
Assistant Attorney General
State of Vermont
109 State Street
Montpelier, VT 05609-1001
Dear Mr. McShane,
Please consider this letter an official citizens’ complaint regarding the political fundraising of Anthony Pollina, a publicly declared “independent” candidate for governor of Vermont.
As you know, the Secretary of State’s office has requested that the Pollina campaign return all contributions of more than $1,000 in order to comply with what it considers to be the current law. To date, the Pollina campaign is refusing to return the money.
As concerned citizens of the State of Vermont, we offer this citizens’ complaint regarding the fundraising actions of the Pollina campaign and its apparent disregard for the law as interpreted by the Secretary of State’s office.
We look forward to hearing from you.
Sincerely,
Michael Colby & Boots Wardinski
Money & Politics
August 7, 2008 | 6 Comments
It’s all the rage to talk about money and politics. But I think we’re focusing on the wrong end. Sure, we should keep track of the donors to political campaigns. But I think it’s just as important that we begin to ponder the wealth of those seeking our publicly-funded political offices.
Take Vermont’s campaign for governor, for example. Our sitting – and I do mean sitting – Governor, Jim Douglas, recently announced that he and his wife, a dental assistant, are worth more than $2 million and have no debt. The peculiar thing about this Republican’s amassing of wealth is that he’s spent his entire professional career as a “public servant,” working in various elected government jobs since he graduated from Middlebury College 30-some years ago. So you have to wonder how seriously we have to take Douglas when he spills forth with his “big, bad government” mantra. I guess what he really means is that government is “bad for thee, but not for me!” Two million dollars worth – and counting.
Douglas’ Democrat opponent, Gaye Symington, is also a millionaire many times over. She’s just trying to be coy by not including her husband’s wealth in the financial filings she recently handed over to the Vermont press. Her husband, Chuck Lacy, was one of the original honchos at Ben & Jerry’s back when the company’s stock was being handed out like candy and those at the top – like Lacy — walked away with more loot than they knew what to do with. So much loot, in fact, that folks like Lacy started their own charitable foundations to give gobs of it away. Nice work if you can get it.
Without her hubby’s millions, Symington declared a personal worth of close to $400,000. But you’ve got to be more than a hypocritical fool (or, for that matter, drinking way too much Dem Kool-Aid) to buy her argument against releasing their joint financial information.
“I’m running for office,” Symington declares, “not my family.”
Okay, Gaye, fan the flames of interest all you want but that kind of lameness isn’t going to make the issue – or the millions of dollars — go away. Besides, I’ll bet you won’t be distancing yourself from “the family” when the photo-ops, the door knocking, the advertisements, the advice, and the support come into play, huh? Of course not.
The simmering issue of Symington taking Vermonters for fools by refusing to release her joint financial picture should be dispensed with by two recent political examples: Hillary Clinton released joint financial statements in her run for president; and national Democrats made a huge issue of the McCains’ refusal to release joint financial statements. Checkmate, Gaye. Release them or prepare yourself for more questions.
Speaking of spousal wealth, the newly declared “Independent” in this campaign, Anthony Pollina, announced that he and his wife (emphasis on “wife”) are worth around $800,000. But if you look more closely at the filing you’ll see that there’s a pot of gold on his wife’s side that is just waiting to be handed over whenever it’s needed. Their joint income of around $90,000 last year included $30,000 in income derived from her family’s Maryland-based businesses. Hmm. Again, a nice job if you can get it. Or, in Anthony’s case, marry into it.
But the bigger issue here – for me, at least – is the wealth of these three media-appointed “leaders” in the campaign for governor. Compared to the average Vermont family, these folks are financial kings and queens. And the same is true when you take a gander at the financial pictures of our federally-elected threesome – Senators Patrick Leahy and Bernie Sanders and Congressman Peter Welch (all are millionaires).
When, exactly, will the comparatively extreme wealth of our elected officials and mainstream challengers become an issue? How long will we kid ourselves into thinking and believing that people with such wealth, and, as a result, a built-in disconnect with the economic pains that the rest of us are feeling, will do anything of substance to “change” the system? Hey, it’s worked for them.
None of the aforementioned politicians – or, in the case of Pollina, a wannabe politician – ever have to worry about that pit in their stomach when they go to the mailbox and are greeted by bills that they don’t have the money for. They don’t have to fret about health insurance or even trying to get an appointment to see a doctor (tried that lately?). They don’t sweat with the mental calculations that the rest of us sweat over as we shop for such extravagances as, say, food. They don’t stop filling their gas tank at half-full because that’s all they can afford. And they don’t worry about their retirement, unless, of course, you don’t count the worry of “which house?” or “which boat?”
But yet we continue to elect one wealthy person after another to help us deal with the issues that have made them wealthy and made the rest of us struggle. Nail, meet the hammer, and enjoy the pain.
Personally, I’ve had enough of the crocodile tears from the millionaire politicians. They can’t “feel” our pain. They’ve only been profiting from it.
Sure, let’s get money out of politics, as they say. And we can start by getting the moneyed-elite out of our political offices. Enough already.
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